


very important business

by apolliades



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), SPECTRE (2015), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Domesticity, Drabble, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, M/M, Q being a stubborn little shit, Sappy, Sleep Deprivation, Sleepy Cuddles, Slice of Life, Tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-13
Updated: 2015-11-13
Packaged: 2018-05-01 11:06:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5203487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apolliades/pseuds/apolliades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Don’t you ever sleep?”<br/>“I don’t have time.”<br/>It’s funny – Bond had somehow imagined this conversation going the other way around.</p>
            </blockquote>





	very important business

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Очень важное дело](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11262063) by [hirasava](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hirasava/pseuds/hirasava)



> THIS IS just a soppy thing. it's nothing it's just a soppy fluffy thing. arrrrgh. this was weird all i usually write is angst, and yet, here is some completely angst free content. who am i

“Don’t you ever sleep?”

“Don’t be deliberately obtuse, James. I was sleeping right next to you just a minute ago.”

Q doesn’t look up from the screen of his laptop. It’s approaching three in the morning, and they’d only gone to bed four hours ago, after dinner on the sofa, followed by sex on the sofa. It had been long and slow and delicious and rather soporific—for Bond, at least.

“—for more than a couple of hours a night?”

“I don’t have _time_.”

Bond runs his hands over Q’s shoulders and puts his mouth in the crook of his neck. Q wrinkles up his nose. His fingers don’t slow where they’re flying over his keyboard.

“Don’t you ever switch off?”

It’s funny – Bond had somehow imagined this conversation going the other way around. He’d always been notoriously bad at switching off from the job. Perhaps he’s starting to feel his age.

Q makes a vague humming noise. His face is lit up all blue and white. It makes him look sallow.

“You know, England won’t come crashing down around our feet if you take a night off.”

Bond nips at the skin behind Q’s ear. Q wriggles his shoulders as if he’s contemplating whether to shake him off.

“It’s not England I’m worried about,” he hammers the same key a few times. His eyes are wide and bloodshot and you could land a jumbo jet on the dark circles underneath them. “Have you _met_ the Chinese government?”

“Playing the vigilante, are we?”

“You’re one to talk.”

Bond chuckles. His breath is warm on Q’s neck and he shivers, just a little, and sighs gently.

When Q removes a hand from the keyboard for just long enough to push his hair out of his eyes Bond doesn’t miss the way his fingers tremble ever so slightly.

“When’s the last time you ate?”

Q frowns, and it’s directed at Bond even though he still doesn’t turn away from his screen.

“You know the answer to that. We had dinner together this evening. I hope you aren’t going senile in your old age.”

“And before that?”

For a minute Q is quiet, fingers clacking determinedly on the laptop’s keyboard.

Bond murmurs his name into his ear. Not ‘Q’ – his real name, which is reserved for only the most intimate of moments. Q hates his real name in anyone else’s voice. In Bond’s, it’s almost sweet.

“That’s a question, isn’t it,” he murmurs.

“I hope _you_ aren’t going senile.”

Another minute passes in silence. Bond thumbs circles onto Q’s shoulder blades where they press sharp against the thin fabric of his t shirt.

Q starts to yawn and tries to swallow it. It makes his shoulders shudder and his throat bob. His eyelids flutter.

“Right. That’s enough, Q. China can wait.”

“No it _can’t_ —what are you doing?”

Bond puts his hands gently but firmly over Q’s slim fingers and pries them away from the keyboard. It isn’t difficult – Q isn’t exactly weak, but he’s the textbook definition of sleep deprived, and he probably couldn’t resist if you paid him.

“ _You’re_ coming back to bed. I’m _sure_ China can manage a few hours without you, darling. They were doing perfectly fine before nineteen ninety six.”

“James, I’m nearly _thirty,_ I wasn’t born in ninety fucking six _._ ”

Q’s fingers wriggle and stretch in Bond’s grip towards his beloved laptop. Bond is seriously considering forbidding him from bringing it over next time.

“James, it _can’t—”_

“Don’t make me carry you.”

Finally, Q looks at him. He cranes his head back and glares into Bond’s face.

“You wouldn’t.”

Bond grins.

“James—”

It only takes a second for Bond to scoop Q up out of his chair and hold him close against his chest. There isn’t much difference in height between them, but Q is slim, and he feels tiny. He squirms in Bond’s arms out of principle for a moment or two, but makes no real effort to escape. His arms are warm and strong and Q has to resist the urge to just close his eyes and melt against Bond’s chest.

“I was busy,” he mumbles, “with very important business.”

Q lets his head rest against Bond’s collarbone and lets him carry him back to the bedroom. All the frantic energy he’d been running has gone out of him suddenly; now that the harsh electric glow of his laptop screen isn’t burning into his eyes they feel ever so heavy. He lets himself go limp. It makes him heavy, but Bond doesn’t mind.

“I know, darling.”

“I’m very pissed off with you just now.”

“I know, darling.”

Q yawns wide as his head hits the pillow. His tongue touches his lower lip, damp and soft pink. Bond has the strangest urge to put his fingertip in his mouth.

“China will still be there in the morning,” Bond tells him, stroking his hair back out of his face. He lies down facing Q and tugs the covers up over them, and rests a hand on his hip, feeling the sharp angle of his hipbone under his thumb.

His eyes are already closing. God, he looks so young.

Q mumbles something unintelligible. He yawns again.

“What was that, Q?”

“Kiss me goodnight, you prick.”

Bond laughs, and kisses him.

-

In the morning Q is hunched over his laptop on the kitchen counter before Bond has even opened his eyes. But at least it’s ten in the morning this time, and not three. At least the sun has actually risen.

“Morning, dear,” Q chirps, actually deigning to look up from whatever he’s doing to flash Bond a smile as he enters the room.

“China still there?”

Q smiles wryly, and leans over the top of his screen to accept a kiss. There are still shadows deep under his eyes, but he looks less like he’s about to keel over. Bond makes a mental note to get him something calorie laden for breakfast.

“Only just. Put the kettle on, would you?”

“God only knows where the world would be without you, Q,” Bond says to him, putting a bag of Earl Grey into a mug for Q and a scoop of coffee into the cafetiere for himself.

Q mock glares at him.

“I’m serious! And God knows where I’d be.”

Q mutters to himself and goes back to his typing, but with a fond sort of smile on his face.

The kettle boils. Bond memorised how Q takes his tea a long time ago. He holds it just out of his reach, and gives him his best stern face.

“Close the laptop.”

“James, don’t be cruel.”

“Close the laptop!”

Q huffs and does what he’s told. Bond pushes his laptop out of reach before he hands over the mug.

“You’re insufferable.”

“I’m saving you from yourself, darling.”

Q’s lips twitch around the rim of his mug.

“And besides,” Bond leans in close and puts his mouth just behind Q’s ear. He feels him shiver, and smiles. “You love me.”

Q pouts and tilts his head so that Bond can plant the softest kiss on his neck. “I do. You awful man. I do.”


End file.
